Choosing a Spec

For Rogues in World of Warcraft, choosing a spec often depends on a few factors including weapon type, playstyle, and intended role (PvE or PvP). Weapon type plays a major role in PvE DPS speccing and will often determine not only which combat spec to go, but possibly even the choice between a Mutilate build and a pure Combat build.

PvE

Typical Combat Build

The PvE Combat build is one of the highest DPS builds for Rogues. This will generally be used if the Rogue is using any of the following for PvE DPS:

Dual Wield Swords

Dual Wield Fist Weapons

Dual Wield Maces

Dual Wield Daggers (Slower Main Hand, Faster Off Hand)

Slow Mace/Fist Main Hand, Sword Off Hand (This particular setup is due to the mechanics of Sword Specialization, where the extra attack generated will go off of the main hand's damage, thus, a harder hitting main hand will gain more extra damage when Sword Spec procs)

Slow Mace/Fist/Sword Main Hand, Dagger Off Hand (much like the above, but using a very fast dagger instead)

For all Combat specs, it's recommended that a slower, higher "top end" damage weapon is used in the main hand, while a faster weapon is used in the offhand.

Typically, the point spread would look like the following:

Combat

2/2 Improved Sinister Strike OR If Combat-Daggers 3/3 Improved Gouge

3/5 Lightning Reflexes OR 2/5 if Combat-Daggers

3/3 Improved Slice and Dice

5/5 Precision

2/2 Endurance OR 2/2 Improved Sprint

5/5 Dual Wield Specialization

5 points of the primary weapon specialization (In the case of a dual spec, go 5/5 for both, and leave off the last 5 points of Assassination below)

1/1 Blade Flurry

2/2 Weapon Expertise

3/3 Aggression

2/2 Vitality

1/1 Adrenaline Rush

1/2 Nerves of Steel OR 1/2 Endurance/Improved Sprint (which ever was not taken above)

5/5 Combat Potency

1/1 Surprise Attacks

Assassination

5/5 Malice

3/3 Ruthlessness OR 2/3 if Combat-Daggers

2/2 Murder OR If Combat-Daggers 3/3 Puncturing Wounds

1/1 Relentless Strikes

5/5 Lethality OR 4/5 if Combat-Daggers

4/5 Vile Poisons OR Leave this out if Combat-Daggers

Subtlety
(Only in the case for Combat-Daggers)

5/5 Opportunity

Some Examples

Mutilate

Typically, a Mutilate build requires the Rogue to be dual wielding daggers and for the best effect. Also, due to the nature of Mutilate, the daggers should have identical speeds and be as slow as possible (typically, 1.8 speed is about the slowest speed one will find on a raiding dagger).

Example

PvP

Shadowstep (Assassination)

Shadowstep builds are primarily PvP builds. They offer little in sustained DPS and typically fall far behind Combat specs (assuming equal gearing level). However, they are not as dependent on weapon type as Combat and Mutilate builds.

A typical Assassination based Shadowstep build would look like (non-Daggers):

Subtlety

5/5 Master of Deception

2/2 Dirty Tricks

5/5 Camouflage

3/3 Initiative

1/1 Ghostly Strike

2/2 Elusiveness

3/3 Serrated Blades

2/2 Heightened Senses

1/1 Preparation

2/2 Dirty Deeds

1/1 Hemorrhage

5/5 Deadliness

1/1 Premeditation

3/3 Cheat Death

5/5 Sinister Calling

1/1 Shadowstep

Assassination

5/5 Malice

3/3 Ruthlessness

2/2 Murder

1/1 Relentless Strikes

5/5 Lethality

3/5 Vile Poisons

Dagger Variant

If using Daggers, changing the following would also work well:

Subtlety

4/5 Master of Deception

5/5 Opportunity

0/5 Camouflage

3/3 Improved Ambush

0/1 Hemorrhage

4/5 Deadliness

Assassination

3/3 Puncturing Wounds

0/5 Vile Poisons

Alternatively, dropping to 4/5 Lethality and going 5/5 Deadliness will also work, though in general, the damage bonus of Lethality is greater than the 2% more attack power from filling up Deadliness.

Examples

Shadowstep (Combat)

Like the Assassination variation above, this build is primarily of PvP use. It does off some greater sustained damage and higher mobility than the Assassination version with a tradeoff of some lower burst damage.